Breeches and Metaphysics
Thackeray's German Discourse

S. S. Prawer

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Studies In Comparative Literature 1

Legenda

1 November 1997  •  542pp

ISBN: 1-900755-03-3 (paperback)  •  RRP £75, $99, €85

EnglishFiction

The author traces the successive stages of Thackeray's contact with the German world and analyses the discourse he developed as a result. The 'German Sketch Book' which is built up embraces the fiction and criticism of Thackeray's Paris Sketch Book and the impressions related by the 'cockney' traveller in Irish Sketch Book and Notes of a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo. Thackeray's own pictorial illustrations of his writings, and those by Cruikshank, Doyle and Walker, which he supervised and supplemented, are recognised as an integral part of his German discourse.

This is the first full-length study, in any language, of Thackeray's observation and presentation of 'Germany' and 'the Germans' in all the genres in which he worked. The study is a chronological one, setting Thackeray's construction of 'Germany' and 'the Germans' against the background of his own development and of the social, industrial, cultural and political history of Britain and its continental neighbours.

Siegbert S. Prawer is Taylor Professor of German Emeritus in the University of Oxford, and Honorary Fellow of The Queen's College.

Reviews:

  • ‘What Thackeray did not publish Professor Prawer has done for him in this welcome addition to the Thackeray literature.’ — unsigned notice, Times Literary Supplement 1997
  • ‘It is good to have a book of this kind that so thoroughly covers its subject. I have the distinct impression that Prawer has really hunted down and rounded up every last German reference there is in Thackeray and I am glad he has done it.’ — John R. Reed, Analytical and Enumerative Bibliography 11.4, 2000, 326-7
  • ‘Prawer's comprehensive analysis is thoroughly researched and convincing throughout. One of the strongest features of his monograph is the skilful mastery with which the author examines the interaction between the different discourses depicted above, as well as their function in Thackeray's oeuvre as a whole. An essential study for scholars in the field of Anglo-German literary relations and the wider domain of cultural transmission.’ — Susanne Stark, Modern Language Review 96.1, 2001, 298-9 (full text online)

Bibliography entry:

Prawer, S. S., Breeches and Metaphysics: Thackeray's German Discourse, Studies In Comparative Literature, 1 (Legenda, 1997)

First footnote reference: 35 S. S. Prawer, Breeches and Metaphysics: Thackeray's German Discourse, Studies In Comparative Literature, 1 (Legenda, 1997), p. 21.

Subsequent footnote reference: 37 Prawer, p. 47.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)

Bibliography entry:

Prawer, S. S.. 1997. Breeches and Metaphysics: Thackeray's German Discourse, Studies In Comparative Literature, 1 (Legenda)

Example citation: ‘A quotation occurring on page 21 of this work’ (Prawer 1997: 21).

Example footnote reference: 35 Prawer 1997: 21.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)

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